Vikash Sharma

Ganjam: Almost a year after measuring the mass of a star, Odisha born astronomer Kailash Sahu is back in his home town in Belagaon panchayat in Ganjam district. The scientist working at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STSI) of NASA is now spending bulk of his time at his village interacting with people and school students.

Sahu achieved the fete by employing Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity, something which the German physicist longed to do but found to be impossible during his lifetime.

Recalling his childhood memories, Sahu said that his village did not have electricity and it was tough times then. After completing his higher education from Berhampur University in 1977, he then went to IIT Kharagpur and then to other prominent universities abroad and eventually became NASA scientist in new space discovery.

Sahu is known as Planet Hunter in the astronomy fraternity since he has discovered 16 new planets in 2006. Moreover, he became a much talked about personality after he calculated the mass of dwarf star Stein 2051B, the sixth-nearest white dwarf star to Sun.

"Basing on the sun's mass, we calculated the mass of the star which was two-thirds of the mass of the sun," said Sahu.

While interacting with the students in his school, Sahu is spending time showing demos about his achievements and encouraging them to dream big and work hard in life.

Not only students, friends and other villagers expressed their happiness over Sahu’s return to the village.

"We are really proud of Kailash as he has brought laurels for the village, state and the entire country," said Subhash Chandra Sahu, brother.

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